gesture control

Last week, we talked about a new keyboard for Windows 8 called TouchPal. It's been available for Android and iOS devices for some time now, but the company behind the keyboard just recently made it available for Windows 8 touch devices. While, the app was only available on the developer's website, users can now grab it for free in the Windows Store.

When it comes to gesture based typing we often think of Android. Some of the apps for Android include Swype, TouchPal and now the default keyboard in Android 4.2. But on that note, it looks like TouchPal has recently released an app for another platform -- Windows 8. The one catch, the keyboard is not yet available from the Windows Store. UPDATE: This app is now available in the Windows Store - go out and grab it!

Leap Motion, the start-up company that created an innovative gesture-control technology, is expanding its developer program and releasing a new software development kit, as well as giving a whopping 10,000 developers free Leap units over the next two weeks in order to increase the number of potential apps being released for Leap's new technology.

Samsung looks to be doing everything in its power to make sure Smart TVs are a success. Today the company has announced SDK 3.5 for its Smart TV platform, which will allow developers to tap into features like voice and gesture recognition and add the functionality into their own apps. Samsung has made some more minor changes that should help the development process too.

When it comes to the greatest in living room entertainment, Smart TV is only half of the battle: actually accessing that smart content presents challenges of its own. Statistics show that a sizable number of Smart TV owners don't actually use the more advanced features their sets are capable of, intimidated or confused by the complexity of the button-encrusted remotes. Samsung has taken its own route to interactivity, replacing overly-complex remote controls with a combination of gesture, voice and face-recognition.

The Kinect has made motion controls a reality for consoles, and we might soon be seeing similar technology make the jump to PCs and laptops. Rather than using a dedicated motion sensor bar, Microsoft Research is developing a technique called SoundWave that would detect motion and implement controls using only the microphone and speakers on a laptop.

A Google patent filing with the US Patent and Trademark Office has been discovered by PatentlyApple, revealing that the company has invented some new gesture controls for search-related functions on future Android devices. Google extensively explained the concept, which essentially allows users to draw a continuous gesture around some content onscreen to automatically initiate a search for that content in Google.

As one of the relatively few companies across the earth to receive Kinect for Windows & SDK before the official announcement, you know good and well that Microsoft has some faith in the group known as ETRONIKA. And what they've produced here is something that was bound to happen one way or another: Kinect-based online banking. Their solution includes analyzing user's face, voice, and gestures to help them through the process of banking online. Will such a solution sweep the nation, or will we still be too afraid to trust the computer to know our wrinkles and nose shape?

The smart TV realm is growing with lots of consumers opting for TVs that can access the web to get content from channels like YouTube, Netflix and lots more. Hisense and eyeSight have announced a partnership that will see the two firms bring the first Android smart TV to market that has integrated gesture recognition tech inside.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office has just granted Apple a new patent today for its "Slide to Unlock" iOS gesture. The patent application was filed more than a year before the very first iPhone and refers to the unlocking gesture in broad terms as when "contact with the display corresponds to a predefined gesture for unlocking the device."